ANGE POSTECOGLOU has told his Celtic players that they have to stand up and be counted, saying that their poor defensive showing against West Ham stemmed from an unwillingness to compete.
The Celtic manager refused to single out individuals after the 6-2 hammering at the hands of West Ham, even though the back four and goalkeeper Vasilis Barkas were badly at fault for some of the visitors’ goals.
Instead, Postecoglou put the blame for the poor defensive display at the feet of the entire team, who he said forgot to do the dirty work.
“There were some bright things but there some things that weren’t acceptable and it was disappointing overall,” Postecoglou said.
“West Ham are quality opposition but irrespective there are things that are very disappointing.
“You kind of hope you don’t expose individuals to that. Our whole premise is to defend as a unit and attack as a unit.
“The attacking bit was okay but defensively we were poor all over the place. We can address things because a lot of it is just that will and desire to compete.
“We’re at that funny stage where I’m trying to teach the players how to play the game a certain way and sometimes when that happens we forget that the competitive side is also important. You need both and I just felt the football was the priority and we forgot to compete.
“I can’t shield them from it. When you represent this football club and play football in general, you can’t shield people.
“Part of the process is to stand up to things like this when things aren’t going well and react in a positive way.
“You can’t go hiding - I’m not going to go hiding. They’ve just got to stand up and take responsibility for whatever situation arises both good and bad.
“It was OK the other night but it wasn't great today. It's an area we need to keep focusing on. But we just didn't defend well as a unit today. Maybe playing against better quality we shied away from certain things, which you can't afford to do.
“But I'm not sure about assessing individual performances after today. Collectively, we didn't stick to our task in a defensive sense.
“We were bright going forward and showed a willingness to play our football.
“But you've got to match that with the other side of the game.”
Postecoglou hopes that young defenders Stephen Welsh and Dane Murray don’t take a knock to their confidence from the way they were continually cut open, though he admits it is a worry ahead of the game against Midtjylland on Wednesday night.
“Possibly, but it's a team game,” he said. “We exposed them tonight when we didn't have to.
“We know they're young and understand they'll make mistakes. But they didn't get good enough support around them. We didn't defend well as a team.
“It was disappointing because there were some positive things in it. But there were also bits of our game that were poor.
“And against a good quality opponent you get punished.”
There are no other options for Postecoglou to turn to in order to freshen up his side for the game in Denmark, with new signings Kyogo Furuhashi and Carl Starfelt still not able to join the squad.
“The problem right now is that we've signed two who we can't even use.,” he said. “For me, we still need another few players to come in.
“We don't have any other options in defence. Unless they've been hiding from me. I can only play the ones who are available.
“We've got a clean bill of health tonight so everyone will be fit and available. (Albian) Ajeti had a little knock so missed out. And Olly (Ntcham) just wasn't ready today.”
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